


these are the last blues we're ever going to have

by orphan_account



Series: so much left i haven't learned [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: (but only maybe), (was not all it was cracked up to be), Divorce, Future Fic, Getting Back Together, M/M, Married Life, Separations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:07:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23668105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Three white dots bounced aggressively next to Shitty's icon. It's a selfie of the whole gang, happily smiling and laughing, at Shitty and Lardo's wedding two years ago."So," the iMessage reads, "who gets custody of us in the divorce?"
Relationships: Eric "Bitty" Bittle & Jack Zimmermann, Eric "Bitty" Bittle & Samwell Men's Hockey Team, Eric "Bitty" Bittle & Suzanne Bittle, Eric "Bitty" Bittle/Jack Zimmermann, Larissa "Lardo" Duan/Shitty Knight
Series: so much left i haven't learned [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1704562
Comments: 8
Kudos: 45





	these are the last blues we're ever going to have

Eric uses Jack’s credit card to buy his ticket back to Georgia. 

It’s something that just sort of happens, or at least that’s what he tells himself. He goes to the ticket counter with the plan to upgrade himself from Business Class to First Class on his flight from New York to Providence. 

His meeting with his publisher in New York was absolutely dismal. His third cookbook wasn’t exactly as selling as well as they thought that it would, and words like “old media” and “strong lack of recent presence” and “aging out of the target audience” were thrown around, each one like a little knife right through his heart. Bitty watched in abject horror as his publishers all seemed to agree that his career was nearing its end. He nodded along politely as they chastized for him for being behind on his content output. He shook the hands that signed the paperwork to delay the renewal of his contract. He laughed because he felt like crying.   
  
Eric texts Jack as soon as he has rushed out of their office. He had been aggressively blinking back tears the entire fifty-floor trip down to the lobby. He collects his luggage, the name Eric Bittle-Zimmermann neatly blocked on the tag in Jack’s handwriting., He offers the receptionist a horribly fake and watery smile. If she pities him, she doesn’t say anything.    
  


He texts him about the fact that his career has an expiration date, the fact that he had no idea what he was going to do next, the fact that he hadn’t written a resume since the career readiness class he took junior year of college.    
  
Jack responds, leaving him on read for forty-five minutes.   
  
_ Well, we always knew that your career had an expiration date, Bud. It’s not a big deal. You don’t even have to work, really. _ _  
_ _  
_ Jack responds. Jack responds earnest and uncomplicated in his speech. Jack responds straight to the point. Jack responds seemingly forgetting that his career too has an expiration date, that he’s only a few years or one brutal injury from being in the same spot Bitty is in. Jack responds, sometimes, unempathetic and cruel.

Bitty sits through the entire Uber ride from Manhattan to Newark blinking back tears. His Uber driver, a hearty and sympathetic Middle Eastern man, didn’t say a word. Bless his sweet soul. 

When he gets to the airport, the only thought running through his head is the fact that he’d truly like nothing more to unwind with a glass of Prosecco and a magazine he picked up in the airport kiosk on his way to Providence. He wanted to get to the condo that he and Jack shared and give it a good clean. Then he wanted to bake himself a fat apple pie, slather it with caramel and ice cream, and purposely watch something that wasn’t the Falconers vs. Penguins game that was going to be on at 9 PM. Or at least that was the original plan.    
  


Instead, Bitty looks at the kind girl who was working at the counter, lipstick shade the exact color of her Delta-issued scarf, and the words that come out of his mouth are “Can I get one ticket for the 11:30 AM flight to Atlanta, please?”   
  
She nods curtly as she begins to punch some information into her terminal. An artificially blonde braid falls over her face, and she furrows her brow in frustration.    
  
“Just to confirm, I just booked for you the 11:30 AM flight from Newark to Atlanta. Is that correct?” She says as she continues to tap away on her terminal.    
  
Bitty could have easily corrected himself. He imagines himself in his head apologizing profusely.    
  
“Oh, no, I am  _ so  _ sorry, sweetheart,” The ghost of another Bitty says in the back of his head. “I just don’t know where my head is these days. All this traveling and daylight savings, and God- I guess I just didn’t know what I was saying. I already have a ticket for the 10:38 AM to Providence. I was just looking to upgrade to First Class. I know it’s early, but a glass of wine is just calling my name.”   
  
Like Bitty learned when he was in the third grade, ghosts aren’t real. So of course, that isn’t what he says. 

_ Apparently,  _ a darker part of his brain replies back,  _ neither are fairy tales _ .   
  
“Yup, that’s right. Thank you,” is what comes pouring out of his mouth. And before he even realizes it, he is pulling out his wallet to hand over his Driver’s License, wincing at the Rhode Island I.D., and Jack’s frequent flyer card. He watches eagerly as she swipes his card and neatly folds his ticket. He rolls up and down on the balls of his feet as he grabs the ticket out of her hand. He shoves into his pocket without thinking much. 

In the TSA line, he tries to console himself. This was just a little trip to get some distance, some perspective, a new way of looking at things. Being at his parents’ house would clarify something, anything really. His mother would make his favorite foods, do his laundry, rub his head even if he was starting to push thirty. He’d feel refreshed when he’d come home to Providence. He’d get back into his cookbook writing, really devote himself to producing more content. He and Jack would -.    
  
He and Jack would -.    
  
Well, Jack would appreciate the miles. He had been planning a big World War II trip with his father, through some kind of travel company. They were going to visit the UK, France, Germany, and some other country; Bitty wasn’t really listening when Jack was describing it. There might of been some kind of religious element to it. Jack and Bob planned to do some genealogy, to trace their few relatives that experienced the Holocaust. Or at least, Bitty thinks that Jack brought up something like that. Jack never asked Bitty to come.   
  
His brain tried to push back on the idea as he handed the TSA agent his passport and his plane ticket. Jack and his father were both multi-millionaires who did not need free Delta miles to jet off to Europe on vacation.    
  
Bitty physically shook his head like he was trying to knock the realization from his mind. 

-

Bitty felt overdressed in comparison to Jack.    
  
Jack hadn’t bothered to slick his hair back, nor did he bother to wear a tie. He simply let his hair flop over his eyes, and Bitty tried to avert his gaze from the fact that Jack had left the top button of his dress shirt unbuttoned under his jacket. He was speaking to his lawyer, voices hushed and low. Bitty couldn’t understand what they were saying. Instead, he focused on counting the stars on the American flag.    
  
He tries to name the states in order after he makes the very quick count to fifty.,  _ Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas.  _ He gives up around Hawaii. Instead he fidgets with his fingers, picking at his cuticles and staring around the room. Jack was still discussing something with his lawyer. Bitty’s own divorce lawyer, who cost him a true arm and a leg, was chatting amicably with the judge - hopefully a good sign. 

  
Bob and Alicia were there. They were quietly speaking to one another in French that they had to know was too fast for Bitty to understand. They looked bored, unaffected. They looked like this was a horrible charity function that they could not wait to slip away from. And that hurt. Bitty would have preferred them to be angry or sad or anything really. Desperately, he wanted some kind of emotion that indicated that this matter, that Bitty’s marriage mattered, that he mattered.    
  
He glances back at them, and they avert their gaze.    
  


-

He arrives in Atlanta and is surprised by the heat. Atlanta in March used to be easy and pleasant. Living up north has made him soft, changed in him more ways than just his weather preferences.

He slides into a booth inside the airport Starbucks. The condensation is already starting to gather around the side of his cup. He takes a sip of his iced coffee and recoils over the taste of acid and bitterness. That’s what he gets for ordering airport coffee at 3:00 PM in the afternoon on a Wednesday. He imagines that the carafe probably hadn’t been changed since the morning, even maybe since last night. He makes a mental note to go get more cream and sugar.    
  
He quickly comes to the realization that there’s no need to make a mental note. He has no other things he needs to do. He has no other pressing concerns. For the first time all day, he realizes he’s jetted off with no plan and without telling anyone where he’s going.

It’s not the worst thing he’s ever done.   
  
He absentmindedly wanders over to the sugar and cream station. He dumps in an unholy amount of both into his plastic cup and swirls. He takes a sip, chews on the straw, and thinks about his next move. The coffee is saccharine, but Bitty minds it less than the way it was before. 

That might be a good metaphor for his life.    
  
Wandering aimlessly, he plucks his phone out of his pocket. There’s a message from Jack asking him if he made it home okay. Bitty quickly swipes it away. He browses through his contacts. There are a few friends he could call. They were his friends from high school and figure skating, and most of them had stuck around Georgia. Most of them were married too. Happily, Bitty assumed. He could call his friends from Samwell, ask them what they think he should do. But they’re Jack’s friends too, and they would certainly relay the message that he was not in Providence anymore. He could call the fellow WAGs from Jack’s team. He liked them well enough, and they had all fallen into an easy friendship. But there’s no way they’d keep it from their husbands, and there was no way that their husbands wouldn’t tell Jack. 

Bitty settles on his parents.    
  
Coach picks up on the third call. That was two calls quicker than Bitty originally expected.    
  
“What’s up, Junior? You know I have practice around this time.”   
  
Of course Bitty knows that his father has practice. It’s been ingrained in him since he was a toddler that from 3:30 to 5 PM on Mondays through Thursday and from 5 to 10 PM on Fridays was exclusively football time. Hell or high water, that practice was going to continue. Coach didn’t even forgo practice after his own mother died.    
  
For the first time, Bitty realized that Jack and his father shared that trait. When first met Jack, he was so enamored with his commitment, his resilience, his follow-through. Five years of marriage had dulled that. The past few months had completely shattered it. This trait, in his father, in Jack, in probably thousands of other men, was less about the team than it was about themselves. It was just another way to avoid talking about anything real.   
  
“Course, I did, Daddy.” Bitty swirls his coffee in his other hand. The cup is soaked now, and the cream is starting to separate from the coffee. He debates throwing it away. He doesn’t.

Coach grunts and from a distance, Bitty can hear the dreaded whistle that only has to have meant that conditioning had started for the boys. “Must be serious if you called then.”

“Wouldn’t’ve called if it wasn’t,” Bitty nods. There is no one to see. “Daddy, I’m at the Atlanta airport right now, and I need you to come pick me up.”

-

Jack texts the group chat in May, a full week after their divorce papers had been filed and submitted.   
  
Ideally, Bitty thought that they would draft some kind of statement about love and friendship and the enduring difficulties of a long term, often long-distance relationship. Unfortunately, neither of them were particularly good at writing, and neither of them were speaking to one another at the moment.

  
So instead he gets:   
  
“Hi, All. I just wanted to let you know so you found out from us, rather the press. Eric and I are getting a divorce.”   
  
Bitty blinks twice when the message pops up. He’s tempted to call Jack, to yell at him for sharing this without his permission. He’s tempted to get back on a plane and to try to make it work. Seeing it on his screen, laid bare in front of his friends, somehow makes it seem much more real than filling the divorce papers and mailing them to Montreal.    
  
It’s an unpleasant sensation. 

  
There are no responses for twenty-four hours. Bitty tries to spend the day busy. He goes for a run when he first wakes up. He pushes himself harder than he has in months, and he relishes the feeling of his calves revolting against him. When he comes home, he showers and prepares coffee for his parents. Each of them thank him profusely, and his mother even offers to stay home and sit with him as he waits for a response. He just waves her off, and by 9 AM, he’s alone again. He bakes two pies. He applies to several jobs, mostly in Georgia and Massachutues. Media editor, museum coordinator, cafe manager, videographer, all of it starts to blend together. When he tires of that, he cooks his parents supper. He cleans up his childhood bedroom. He researches Master’s programs. 

But mostly, Bitty sits alone in the Georgia heat, constantly refreshing the page. He hopes that someone will say something, say something that is important or meaningful or even something that acknowledged that this was happening.    
  
Why has all of this felt like it’s been happening in a dream?    
  
The next morning, in the midst of preparing yogurt parfaits and lattes, Bitty finally sees it. Three white dots bounced aggressively next to Shitty's icon. It's a selfie of the whole gang, happily smiling and laughing, at Shitty and Lardo's wedding two years ago.    
  
It’s one of Bitty’s favorite memories. Jack dramatically waltzed him across the dance floor and gave a toast that even made Shitty’s grandparents cry. Lardo and Holster and Ransom and Bitty reenacted the Single Ladies dance. They all drank until dawn, and then they got breakfast at McDonald’s in their wedding clothing. Bitty’s cookbooks were selling like hotcakes. Jack’s team was on a winning streak. Life was good. 

Why wasn’t there a way to realize that you were in the good old days before you left them?

"So," the iMessage reads, "who gets custody of us in the divorce?"

It’s only a few seconds before another message pops up.    
  
“Sorry,” Shitty amends, “wrong chat.”   
  
Bitty turns his phone off for a week. 

-

Bitty is in Georgia a week when he sees Bob’s caller ID pop up on his phone. He’s not entirely sure why he decides to answer but he does. 

He hasn’t been answering Jack other than a short message to tell him where he is and that he needs some space. Jack says something about needing to talk, but he never calls. Bitty tries to decipher what that meant.    
  
Well, Bitty wasn’t entirely truthful with himself. He knew exactly the reason he decided to take Bob’s call. There’s a pit at the bottom of his stomach that refuses to be ignored. Knowing Jack’s history, a deep dark place in Bitty’s head that assumes there was a fair chance Jack might be dead, and it might be all his fault. Of course, Bitty took a bystander training as part of his captain duties, and he knows that no one can drive someone to suicide. But still -. 

“Hi, Eric!” Bob’s voice is chipper, and there is a flood of relief that washes over Bitty. That was not the voice of someone who just lost their son. So there was that. But the put in his stomach still remains. “How have you been?”   
  
Horrible, Bitty wants to say. Being on the verge of a divorce for no reason other than there has been a gnawing feeling of being trapped into the same person when you were nineteen years old is horrible. Talking to your current but maybe soon-to-be ex-father-in-law is also quite horrible.    
  
However, Bitty is horrible at verbalizing things. He’s a Southern gentleman. His mama has just walked into the room. So taking all of the things together, of course, Bitty doesn’t say that.   
  
“I’m doing well, how ‘bout yourself?” Bitty forces himself to smile so his voice will reach an upbeat tone. “It’s been wonderful to get to spend some quality time with my parents. I don’t think I’ve spent as much time with them since before I was in college.”   
  


“That’s wonderful,” says Bob warmly. “And I am doing okay, Eric. Thank you for asking. As you’d have it, I actually just got off the phone with Jack.”   
  
Jack. Of course, it was about Jack. Of course, Bob wasn’t calling out of any real concern for Bitty. In the background, Suzanne was wrestling Bitty’s famous peach pie out of the freezer drawer. The sound of tin knocking against the heavy-duty plastic of their fridge was grating. Bitty was actively trying to not roll his eyes.    
  
“I was just hoping you could call him sometime soon. He’s in just an awful state, Eric, and I think that he would really appreciate hearing from you,” Bob continues. “Please just give him a call.”   
  
Bitty purses his lips as he carefully watches his mother cut two large slabs from the pie. He wonders if he had the time and ingredients to make a batch of fresh whipped cream. He’ll have to check when he gets off the phone.    
  
“I’ll try,” Bitty offers weakly. He clicks the phone off before Bob has a chance to say anything else. He only feels moderately bad about it.    
  
“Who was that?” His mama asks softly while he rummages through the fridge to find some heavy whipping cream. She is hovering around him like if she left him alone, he’d break.   
  
“Bob.” He can’t find the carton. He knocks over a whole basket of blueberries in the process. He frowns aggressively while trying to scoop up the spoiled berries.    
  
“Bob who?”   
  
“Bob Zimmermann. Who else would I be talking to?”   
  
“I don’t know most of your friends, Dicky.” His mother’s voice is soft. Bitty almost feels bad about being so cross with her. Almost, though. “I didn’t know. Could’ve really been anyone. What did he want?”   
  
“Wants me to call Jack, said Jack was talking to him about how much he wished I’d call.”   
  
“And how old is Jack?”

  
“Thirty-two, going on thirty-three.”   
  
“Imagine being in your thirties and having your daddy doing your dirty work for you.” Bitty’s mother made a soft and disapproving noise. Bitty finds himself blinking away tears. “A damn shame.”

-

Falling out of love with Jack was the same as falling in love. It happens slowly and then all at once. 

**Author's Note:**

> i know that check please is supposed to be much more hallmark channel than HBO, but maybe marrying the first guy you ever kissed at 22 years old was not the best move.


End file.
